Keep border crossings open plea from Serbia to Hungary

Europe has to find a solution fast before the situation escalates even further. This border crossing, one of the main ones in Europe, has to remain open insists Social affairs minister Aleksandar Vulin

Social affairs minister Aleksandar Vulin toured the Hungary-Serbia border and said: "The Hungarians never told us that they will close the border".

Mr Vulin, who was inspecting the Serbian side of the Roszke-Horgos border checkpoint, added: "This is not only a Hungarian and Serbian problem. This is a problem for the whole of Europe.

"Europe has to find a solution fast before the situation escalates even further. This border crossing, one of the main ones in Europe, has to remain open."

Mr Vulin spoke on the day that Hungary put new laws into effect designed to stop the flow of migrants entering the country from Serbia.

Meanwhile, Austria is warning that the country might soon be short of emergency shelters for people streaming into the country from Hungary.

The Interior Ministry says that it had 20,000 places across the country as of Monday night, compared to the approximately 19,700 that needed shelter.

The ministry said that 4,000 more had arrived as of noon on Tuesday.

It was unclear how many would stay at least for the next few days and how many would try to travel on to Germany.

The governor of Turkey's north-western province of Edirne says that nearly 7,000 asylum-seekers in the past week have been caught and turned back as they headed toward the country's western borders with Greece and Bulgaria, according to Turkey's state-run news agency.

Anadolu Agency quoted Governor Dursun Ali Sahin as saying that asylum-seekers would not be permitted to walk to the Greek and Bulgarian border crossings.

They were being returned to the areas they had been registered in within Turkey.

The police and gendarmerie have increased checkpoints at the entrances to the city of Edirne, Anadolu said.

More than 250,000 people have crossed from Turkey to Greece so far this year, with most undertaking a perilous boat trip to nearby Greek islands.

But with deadly shipwrecks claiming lives, some are seeking to cross Greece's short, heavily-guarded land border with Turkey.